This invention relates to volleyball officiating aids and in particular to a volleyball net touch violation detecting and indicating system for improving the quality of judgement calls by officials during play.
Net touch violations in a fast paced volleyball game are difficult to detect and frequently require a judgement call by the official refereeing the game. If two or more players are in the vicinity of the net when an infraction occurs it is difficult to tell which player on which team is at fault. When players from both teams violate the net within fractions of a second of each other it is almost impossible to determine which player was the first violator and should be charged with the penalty. Furthermore, a volleyball may strike the net while two or more players are in the vicinity. If the official's view is obstructed by other players he sees only the net movement and the other players and his judgement as to which team, or the ball, caused net movement may be in error.
In view of these officiating difficulties it is apparent that some means for automatically detecting and indicating net touch violations is highly desirable. Although a system for achieving this would be primarily used as an officiating aid it would also be useful in unofficial games with no official and would allow the players to make net touch calls they could not otherwise make.
The present state of the art does not provide for such a system, however. The U.S. Pat. No. 4,081,798 of L. F. Pelfrey entitled Let Ball Detector issued Mar. 28, 1978 discloses a system that indicates when a ball strikes the top of a net. The system does not distinguish between player and ball and does not indicate on which side of the net the infraction occured.
In accordance with the foregoing discussion it is seen that there currently exists the need for a volleyball net touch detecting and indicating system that indicates which team caused the violation and that discriminates between player and ball. The present invention is directed toward satisfying that need.